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Solving the Tesla Semi truck conundrum: here’s what it might take
With the release of Tesla’s updated vision for the future, CEO Elon Musk included plenty of information that was both intriguing and light on details. From that, we will try to make a guess as to what Tesla’s plans are in reference to trucks and shed light on the many obstacles that the company will need to overcome before making its plans a reality.
The light details of Musk’s announcement is par for the course from Tesla and Co, which operates its marketing as much on hype and viral sharing as anything else. This is not a knock against the company, as most other firms would sacrifice virgins every Friday to see the same kind of unsolicited viral marketing that Tesla generates. One thing Elon has mastered is walking the fine line between being informative and forthcoming and being vague enough to cause rampant speculation.
In the company’s “Part Deux” plans for the future, a brief and almost passing mention of semi-trucks was made as a part of Tesla’s developments. Specifically, Must referred to “heavy-duty trucks” and called the idea a “Tesla Semi.” This can imply two things, but probably implies both. It could imply that Tesla plans to make a heavy-duty truck – which could mean a three-quarter ton pickup truck, a Class B heavy truck, or a large Class A freight-hauling truck. Or it can imply that Tesla plans to make a semi-truck only (aka “18 wheeler”). We believe it’s likely that they plan to do all of the above.
Currently, about 70 percent of the freight being moved around the United States is moved on semi-trucks in which a large tractor is attached to a separate trailer. These trucks typically operate at weights up to 80,000 pounds in vehicle, freight, and fuel. They are referred to as “Class A” trucks because the weight class requires an operator’s license of that type. Yet that is only one class of truck. And the typical over-the-road (OTR) truck we usually think of when talking about semi-trucks are just one slice of a large trucking pie.
Nearly 12,000 million tons of freight are hauled by trucks every year in the United States. A significant portion of that hauling is done by smaller trucks rather than large semi-trucks. Package carrying (van) trucks, dump trucks, refuse (garbage) trucks, and other specialized trucks are also common and actually make up a larger portion of the miles driven by heavy-duty trucking. Most of these vehicles have a gross weight of 26,000 pounds or more, by definition, so for our purposes here we will be excluding passenger-style heavy-duty pickups and the like. We are assuming that Musk is referring to freight hauling, given his statements.
With the plan to “cover the major forms of terrestrial transport” that Tesla put forth, we can assume that the company plans to design and potentially build heavy-duty trucks of all stripes. This is realistic given that major truck builders such as Paccar (Kenworth, Peterbilt), Volvo, Mack, etc. already do this. One basic design can be modified to match several needs, thus a single model Mack truck can be both an OTR freight puller and a dump truck with just a few changes to the drivetrain and chassis. Medium-duty trucks, such as package delivery (ala UPS, FedEx) box trucks can also be of a single design with multiple body options. Although the reality is a bit more complicated than this, the gist is that it is possible to design only a couple of vehicles and have them workable in most major truck markets. Knowing this, we will concentrate on the most difficult to achieve, over-the-road heavy-duty semi-trucks.
Knowing that, there are obstacles to overcome. The challenges of a Tesla pickup truck are a beginning, but with a heavy freight hauler, they become exponential. Here are some basic requirements for the biggest of these HD trucks:
- Power output similar to a large diesel engine, equalling roughly 450-550 horsepower and 800-1,200 pound-feet of torque. The amount of output depends heavily on the work to be done. A typical OTR truck, for example, falls in the lower end of this spectrum to maximize fuel efficiency while a typical off-road construction or heavy-load truck (logging and the like) will be at the higher end.
- An operating range of 600 miles per charge for OTR and about half that for more local use (construction, large trailer/freight delivery). Smaller trucks doing package deliveries could operate in the 150-mile range easily.
- The capability to haul as much or more freight than the current diesel-powered offerings do.
That last point is important. Getting a 600-mile range for a truck that can weigh up to 80,000 pounds, freight included, is pretty simple. Getting a 600-mile range for a truck and trailer weighing under 35,000 pounds is not as easy. It’s the old problem of more batteries equals more range, but also equals more weight.
There have been and are current attempts at electrifying semi-trucks, of course. Mostly in the medium-duty package delivery and trailer moving (non-transport) sectors. Solutions involving hydrogen fuel cells, battery-electrics, hydraulic hybrids, and more have been produced. Some did not do well (see Smith Transport) and some are going places (see Parker-Hannifin’s hydraulic hybrids). For the most part, battery-electric over-the-road trucks are seen as a pipe dream by most in the industry. There are good reasons for this. Not the least of which are the battery weight and range expectations of the trucks. Nevermind the likely long charging times required.
Walmart’s WAVE concept truck features an electric powertrain and lightweight carbon fiber trailer
Without getting too detailed, most OTR drivers expect to put in 600 or more miles per day in a solo run (one driver) and about 1,000 or so when team driving. Most fuel stops are 15-20 minutes and most trucks have a range of 700-1,000 miles when fitted with dual tanks (one on either side). Having enough lithium-ion batteries on board to do that is daunting. Especially given the high power outputs required to move 80,000 pounds worth of rig and freight.
There are solutions for this, of course. Since Musk devoted so much of his announcement to autonomous driving, we can assume the plan is to include that with trucking. Three possible ideas are:
Relaying. A truck takes a trailer 300-400 miles, swaps it with a trailer going back where it came from, and returns. The trailer swapped continues on with on another truck for another 300-400 miles, then another, and another.. Until its final destination and delivery. This is currently done with certain types of freight and these trucks often have shorter trailers and run them as doubles (one attached to another). Automating this might be a solution. At least for some types of freight.
Battery swapping. The truck drives for a certain range of miles, stops somewhere to have its emptied battery swapped with a full one, and continues. If done in 10-15 minutes and not more than twice a day, this would be realistic under the current trucking paradigm with a driver on board. When automated, the swaps could be as often as you’d like, though each stop means delays in shipment.
Partial electrification. This would be a truck which runs on electricity but has an on-board combustion generator. This is a potential solution, but is not likely to be on Tesla’s agenda.
Another option that should be considered, though it might not be what Tesla fans will want to hear: Musk may be planning on taking a standard semi-truck and automating it. In other words, the Tesla Semi could actually be an automation system, not an actual truck. At least in the beginning. Given the huge amount of technical obstacles, some of which may not be surmountable without combustion, this is a viable guess. At least for OTR trucks.
Any of these ideas or a combination are realistic for a Tesla Semi strategy in regards to OTR trucks. There are no shortage of plans (grandiose and otherwise) for transforming the trucking industry via electrification. Seeing Teslas will at least be interesting.
Tesla Optimus showed off its newest capability as progress on the project continues to accelerate toward an ultimate goal of mass production in the coming years.
Tesla is still developing Optimus and preparing for the first stages of mass production, where units would be sold and shipped to customers. CEO Elon Musk has always marketed the humanoid robot as the biggest product in history, even outside of Tesla, but of all time.
He believes it will eliminate the need to manually perform monotonous tasks, like cleaning, mowing the lawn, and folding laundry.
However, lately, Musk has revealed even bigger plans for Optimus, including the ability to relieve humans of work entirely within the next 20 years.
JUST IN: Elon Musk says working will be ‘optional’ in less than 20 years because of AI and robotics. pic.twitter.com/l3S5kl5HBB
— Watcher.Guru (@WatcherGuru) November 30, 2025
Development at Tesla’s Artificial Intelligence and Robotics teams has progressed, and a new video was shown of the robot taking a light jog with what appeared to be some pretty natural form:
Just set a new PR in the lab pic.twitter.com/8kJ2om7uV7
— Tesla Optimus (@Tesla_Optimus) December 2, 2025
Optimus has also made several public appearances lately, including one at the Neural Information Processing Systems, or NeurIPS Conference. Some spectators shared videos of Optimus’s charging rig, as well as its movements and capabilities, most interestingly, the hand:
You have to hand it to Elon 🤟 pic.twitter.com/fZKDlmGAbe
— Ric Burton · NeurIPS 2025 (@_ricburton) December 2, 2025
The hand, forearm, and fingers have been one of the most evident challenges for Tesla in recent times, especially as it continues to work on its 3rd Generation iteration of Optimus.
Musk said during the Q3 Earnings Call:
“I don’t want to downplay the difficulty, but it’s an incredibly difficult thing, especially to create a hand that is as dexterous and capable as the human hand, which is incredible. The human hand is an incredible thing. The more you study the human hand, the more incredible you realize it is, and why you need four fingers and a thumb, why the fingers have certain degrees of freedom, why the various muscles are of different strengths, and fingers are of different lengths. It turns out that those are all there for a reason.”
The interesting part of the Optimus program so far is the fact that Tesla has made a lot of progress with other portions of the project, like movement, for example, which appears to have come a long way.
However, without a functional hand and fingers, Optimus could be rendered relatively useless, so it is evident that it has to figure this crucial part out first.
Elon Musk said in late November that he’s “tried to warn” legacy automakers and “even offered to license Tesla Full Self-Driving, but they don’t want it,” expressing frustration with companies that refuse to adopt the company’s suite, which will eventually be autonomous.
Tesla has long established itself as the leader in self-driving technology, especially in the United States. Although there are formidable competitors, Tesla’s FSD suite is the most robust and is not limited to certain areas or roadways. It operates anywhere and everywhere.
The company’s current position as the leader in self-driving tech is being ignored by legacy automakers, a parallel to what Tesla’s position was with EV development over a decade ago, which was also ignored by competitors.
The reluctance mirrors how legacy automakers initially dismissed EVs, only to scramble in catch-up mode years later–a pattern that highlights their historical underestimation of disruptive innovations from Tesla.
Elon Musk’s Self-Driving Licensing Attempts
Musk and Tesla have tried to push Full Self-Driving to other car companies, with no true suitors, despite ongoing conversations for years. Tesla’s FSD is aiming to become more robust through comprehensive data collection and a larger fleet, something the company has tried to establish through a subscription program, free trials, and other strategies.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk sends rivals dire warning about Full Self-Driving
However, competing companies have not wanted to license FSD for a handful of speculative reasons: competitive pride, regulatory concerns, high costs, or preference for in-house development.
Déjà vu All Over Again
Tesla tried to portray the importance of EVs long ago, as in the 2010s, executives from companies like Ford and GM downplayed the importance of sustainable powertrains as niche or unprofitable.
Musk once said in a 2014 interview that rivals woke up to electric powertrains when the Model S started to disrupt things and gained some market share. Things got really serious upon the launch of the Model 3 in 2017, as a mass-market vehicle was what Tesla was missing from its lineup.
This caused legacy companies to truly wake up; they were losing market share to Tesla’s new and exciting tech that offered less maintenance, a fresh take on passenger auto, and other advantages. They were late to the party, and although they have all launched vehicles of their own, they still lag in two major areas: sales and infrastructure, leaning on Tesla for the latter.
I’ve tried to warn them and even offered to license Tesla FSD, but they don’t want it! Crazy …
When legacy auto does occasionally reach out, they tepidly discuss implementing FSD for a tiny program in 5 years with unworkable requirements for Tesla, so pointless. 🤷♂️
🦕 🦕
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 24, 2025
Musk’s past warnings have been plentiful. In 2017, he responded to critics who stated Tesla was chasing subsidies. He responded, “Few people know that we started Tesla when GM forcibly recalled all electric cars from customers in 2003 and then crushed them in a junkyard,” adding that “they would be doing nothing” on EVs without Tesla’s efforts.
Companies laughed off Tesla’s prowess with EVs, only to realize they had made a grave mistake later on.
It looks to be happening once again.
A Pattern of Underestimation
Both EVs and self-driving tech represent major paradigm shifts that legacy players view as threats to their established business models; it’s hard to change. However, these early push-aways from new tech only result in reactive strategies later on, usually resulting in what pains they are facing now.
Ford is scaling back its EV efforts, and GM’s projects are hurting. Although they both have in-house self-driving projects, they are falling well behind the progress of Tesla and even other competitors.
It is getting to a point where short-term risk will become a long-term setback, and they may have to rely on a company to pull them out of a tough situation later on, just as it did with Tesla and EV charging infrastructure.
Tesla has continued to innovate, while legacy automakers have lagged behind, and it has cost them dearly.
Implications and Future Outlook
Moving forward, Tesla’s progress will continue to accelerate, while a dismissive attitude by other companies will continue to penalize them, especially as time goes on. Falling further behind in self-driving could eventually lead to market share erosion, as autonomy could be a crucial part of vehicle marketing within the next few years.
Eventually, companies could be forced into joint partnerships as economic pressures mount. Some companies did this with EVs, but it has not resulted in very much.
Self-driving efforts are not only a strength for companies themselves, but they also contribute to other things, like affordability and safety.
Tesla has exhibited data that specifically shows its self-driving tech is safer than human drivers, most recently by a considerable margin. This would help with eliminating accidents and making roads safer.
Tesla’s new Safety Report shows Autopilot is nine times safer than humans
Additionally, competition in the market is a good thing, as it drives costs down and helps innovation continue on an upward trend.
Conclusion
The parallels are unmistakable: a decade ago, legacy automakers laughed off electric vehicles as toys for tree-huggers, crushed their own EV programs, and bet everything on the internal-combustion status quo–only to watch Tesla redefine the industry while they scrambled for billions in catch-up capital.
Today, the same companies are turning down repeated offers to license Tesla’s Full Self-Driving technology, insisting they can build better autonomy in-house, even as their own programs stumble through recalls, layoffs, and missed milestones. History is not merely rhyming; it is repeating almost note-for-note.
Elon Musk has spent twenty years warning that the auto industry’s bureaucratic inertia and short-term thinking will leave it stranded on the wrong side of technological revolutions. The question is no longer whether Tesla is ahead–it is whether the giants of Detroit, Stuttgart, and Toyota will finally listen before the next wave leaves them watching another leader pull away in the rear-view mirror.
This time, the stakes are not just market share; they are the very definition of what a car will be in the decades ahead.
News
Waymo driverless taxi drives directly into active LAPD standoff
No injuries occurred, and the passengers inside the vehicle were safely transported to their destination, as per a Waymo representative.
A video posted on social media has shown an occupied Waymo driverless taxi driving directly into the middle of an active LAPD standoff in downtown Los Angeles.
As could be seen in the short video, which was initially posted on Instagram by user Alex Choi, a Waymo driverless taxi drove directly into the middle of an active LAPD standoff in downtown Los Angeles.
The driverless taxi made an unprotected left turn despite what appeared to be a red light, briefly entering a police perimeter. At the time, officers seemed to be giving commands to a prone suspect on the ground, who looked quite surprised at the sudden presence of the driverless vehicle.
People on the sidewalk, including the person who was filming the video, could be heard chuckling at the Waymo’s strange behavior.
The Waymo reportedly cleared the area within seconds. No injuries occurred, and the passengers inside the vehicle were safely transported to their destination, as per a Waymo representative. Still, the video spread across social media, with numerous netizens poking fun at the gaffe.
Others also pointed out that such a gaffe would have resulted in widespread controversy had the vehicle involved been a Tesla on FSD. Tesla is constantly under scrutiny, with TSLA shorts and similar groups actively trying to put down the company’s FSD program.
A Tesla on FSD or Robotaxi accidentally driving into an active police standoff would likely cause lawsuits, nonstop media coverage, and calls for a worldwide ban, at the least.
This was one of the reasons why even minor traffic infractions committed by the company’s Robotaxis during their initial rollout in Austin received nationwide media attention. This particular Waymo incident, however, will likely not receive as much coverage.
Tesla Optimus shows off its newest capability as progress accelerates
Elon Musk and Tesla try to save legacy automakers from Déjà vu
